8 in 10 young voters say their generation would run the country better

(Image credit: Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty Images)

published 30 July 2018

Voters aged 18 to 34 take a dim view of American politics' functionality and suspect their generation could do better, per poll results published Monday by The Associated Press, NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, and MTV.

A majority of young voters believe they cannot have much influence on government, and more than two thirds say elected officials don't really listen to what they have to say. Despite this pessimism, 63 percent said voting in the midterms would give young people "some say about how government runs things." And young voters are more hopeful about their own cohort, with 79 percent agreeing "leaders from their generation would do a better job running the country."

For the 2018 midterm elections, younger voters are presently most motivated by issues of immigration, the economy, and social inequality, the survey found. However, while economic concerns are a constant, other issues have been subject to significant swings in interest as compared to previous AP-NORC/MTV polls from early and late spring. For example, in the immediate aftermath of the high school shooting in Parkland, Florida, in February, 25 percent of young voters said gun policy was a top issue for them. Now, only 2 percent say the same.

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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.

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